Marshall also recused himself from the summits among heads of state that took place periodically throughout the war. He did not think it was wise for a military man to influence political outcomes. At the same time, Marshall was not a political neophyte. Although there were suggestions that he run for office, even for the presidency, he always declined. He knew how Washington worked, and he prided himself on his reputation for being honest and without guile. Periodically, he had to undergo what must have been humiliating examinations—for example, in late 1945 during the investigation of the lack of preparedness at Pearl Harbor, and in the early 1950s when he was wrongly accused by the red-baiting McCarthyites of undermining America’s resistance to communist forces, particularly in Asia. With this latter charge, scurrilous though it was, Marshall took the high road, refusing to dignify McCarthy’s charges with a rebuttal. His reply: “If I have to explain at this point that I am not a traitor to the United States, I hardly think it’s worth it.”
The decision to drop the atomic bomb on Japan was one that Marshall did not want to make. He fully endorsed the development of the bomb and in fact was the chief overseer of the project: General Lesley Groves reported to him. Marshall understood that the decision to drop it was one that would have profound moral consequences, and for that reason he deemed its use not a military decision, but one for the government to make. However, Marshall endorsed the use of the atomic bomb as a means of shortening the war and ultimately saving the lives of both the American soldiers and the Japanese civilians and soldiers who would be killed if Japan were invaded.